We had a guided fishing trip with Fred Palermo, Off the Hook Fishing Adventures, we started out the morning a little slow in the first two spots, the Crappies weren’t cooperating, Fred took us to a third spot and the action really picked up. My grandson was the star of the day catching a lot of nice one, he had the prime spot in the bow of the boat. Overall we caught about 40 fish, we took home 20 really nice 11” or larger crappies, overall a wonderful day fishing.

The in-laws have a cabin not far from Minocqua, Bass and Northern are a common game fish for me and my buddy, so we thought we would try something different. Mr. Palermo contacted me right after booking the trip to get some background and intended fishing target - Musky. Soon after arrival he contacted me again to start working out the details. He discussed some of the options he was looking at, lake, weather conditions, timing etc. All of which, spoke to me about his evaluation of the conditions in order to get into some fish. He finalized the itinerary with meeting up at 6am at JJ Sports in Tomahawk, which we then followed him to Sand Lake. His boat was a good size for the three of us, two clients and the captain. And he provided really good instruction on possible fish locations, casting and techniques with the various types of lures. I believe I had a bite very early on but Muskies are a finicky fish (a fish of a thousand casts). Unfortunately we did not catch anything but expectations overall were fairly low with it being August, and hot and a bright and sunny day. Mr. Palermo was great to hang out with and I learned a lot. Thanks Fred, hopefully the next 1/2 day trip will be more productive!